Wow...

So much has happened since I posted last. I think the most exciting thing was spending a week in Penticton with Adam for Ironman. Last Sunday was the race, but the whole week was super inspiring. We arrived on Wednesday afternoon (after a stop at Precious Memories in Langley...even though Adam so wanted to get to Penticton he stopped for me *S*). Adam took full advantage of everything that was going on that week. On Thursday morning there was an underwear run, on Friday night there was a carbo load dinner and then an Ironman/Oldtimers NHL hockey game. There were people running and cycling everywhere you looked. On Sunday we were up by 4:30 and downtown by just after 5am. The race started at 7am and Adam wanted to finish the 3.8km swim, 180km bike and 42.2km run in about 12 hours. His time ended up being 11:08:12. It was totally amazing to see him pass by me while I was watching way before he kept expecting ot be passing by me. He had an amazing race! There were 2445 finishers and Adam came in 415 overall.




On our way ohome on Tuesday we all went to the PNE. We had spent the whole week in Penticton with some friends and had a great time. Chloe was so excited to see me when I came home. She's kind of been following me around like she thinks I'm going to leave again.

I'll update more later. School starts again on Tuesday and I'm really looking forward to having that time back (as much as I love moody 13 year olds *S*).

Have a great lond weekend!!

Six more sleeps

That's all I have to wait until Harry Potter comes out. And this time when I'm leaving Costco with my book, I'm not going to flip to the back pages to find out what happens (yep...I did it last time and cried all the way home). Or at least I'm going to try my hardest not to do that.

Is anyone else getting it this weekend?

It's 11:30, Friday night

and I have three more badges to sew on Colin's sash before I go to bed so I can get up at 5:30 tomorrow morning to help him get ready to leave for camp. The things mom's do, eh?

I'm watching the Live Earth concert on CTV and Missy Higgins is playing right now in Australia. I've been loving her music. She is absolutely amazing! You can tell that she's popular because everyone seems to know the words to her songs. It's neat to see what music is popular in each country too. I'll be curious to see who plays in the rest of the concerts tomorrow. I'm sure the British one will be great, although Al Gore is supposed to show up at the US one, so I'm sure that will be exciting too. How great to be able to pull something like this off to make people more aware of the earth and global warming!

Well, I guess my fingers have had a little break now. I should get back to sewing. Have a great weekend!!

Hello!!!

I hope everyone had a great Canada Day! Colin was at his dad's and he called me last night to let me know that Titanic was on tv and we talked about how sad it was that Tracey and Allana don't live in Vancouver anymore because we used to always spend Canada Day with them. I'm sure they can't stay away from Vancouver long though!!


I was just looking for a photo of Adam doing his half iron triathlon a couple of weeks ago when I found this photo of me at work. I needed a photo for a class I was taking from Kah-Mei at the POTP retreat of myself at work. So that's the truck I drive. It's new and nice! I love it! It's big too!!

So here's Adam racing a couple of weeks ago. He wanted to qualify for the Ironman Canda race in Penticton in August. Here he is waiting for the swim to start. Swimming is his least favourite part of a triathlon, so he's always nervous right before the race starts.

After the swim he goes on the bike ride, which I can rarely get good photos of because they are in transition and out of transition and gone on their bikes before you know it and I'd rather cheer for him than try to get a great photo of that. So I didn't get a good photo...just a blurry one that I won't inflict on you. But here he is after his bike ride getting on his runners for the run.

The swim was about 2kms, the bike was 80kms adn the run was 20kms. Here he is after the first 10km of the run.

So when Adam crossed the finish line he was pretty sure he hadn't qualified for the Ironman. But the next night he got an email telling him they had a spot for him! So we're heading to Penticton in August for the Ironman! I'm SO dang excited!! My man is going to be in Ironman!!

Well, it's totally late and I have to be at work early tomorrow. Have a great week everyone!!

Lots to catch up on!

Okay...wow...it's been a while since I've posted. Let's see what I've been up to in the last month.

I went to the Pick of the Patch retreat. It was so much fun! It's great to get together with friends that you don't get to see often. I got to meet Angelo. He is SO CUTE!!!!!! Like, seriously! So smiley. It was cute, when Jenn's husband, Jim, came to pick him up so she could scrap the night away, Angelo just stared at him smiling. I thought that was adorable! Shannon and Danielle shared a room with Julia and I (we spent the whole weekend scrapping and playing together). We had great ambitions of getting up early to run and scrap, but when you don't make it to bed before 2am, it doesn't quite work out that way. *S* I took some amazing classes! Yolanda Robinson is amazing (she designs for Fontwerks)! I would take another class with her in a second! I'll make sure I take photos of the cute felt book we made and post it soon. I also took a class from Kah-Mei from Fontwerks. I love her new rub-ons!!!! She is so sweet and uber talented! I was totally blown away with all the techniques that she used in the class. Everyone I show the book to is in awe too! And then the super crazy talented Tracy Kyle. I didn't finish all the layouts, but that was a fun class too. I pretty much won back in prizes what I paid for the classes too, which was a total bonus!

I promise that I'll post photos of the stuff I got (really Jenn...I promise!), but I won a $1000 shopping spree at a great linen and bath store in Victoria, Heirloom Linens. I received a phone call while I was sorting my mail on a Monday morning and the guy from the station asked if I would hold and talk to him on the air for a minute. I really didn't think anything of it, because it's a talk radio station. When he came back on he said that when I had called a few weeks earlier I had been entered into a draw for a prize, and I had won a really great one. It was kind of exciting, and a great way to start a Monday morning off!

Oh, and I'm the June guest designer over at POTP. I had fun with the kit. There's a super cute Maya Road scalloped mini book that came with it too, but I made my own mini book with the cardstock in the kit.


Next Sunday is the New Balance Half Iron triathlon here in Victoria. Adam is racing it and trying to qualify for a spot in Ironman Canada in Penticton this year. I'm sure he can do it and I'm so dang excited to go to Ironman! We were talking about it with some friends the other day. It's going to be awesome!!

Here's a layout I made at Karen's crop last weekend. It was a fun day! I think this has become one of my favourite layouts! I love those MM glitter stickers!


And I'm still running. I'm so glad I signed up for Heidi's BPS class just because it gave me the boost I needed to start. I've enjoyed it more than I thought.

Oh, ya. And poor Colin broke his collar bone almost three weeks ago. It was the holiday Monday in May and he was out skateboarding with a friend and fell off his skateboard. He got up crying and walked over to his friend and told him that he thought he had broken a bone. His friend walked him home, which I thought was really nice. When Colin walked into the house (I actually heard the dogs upstairs barking and had opened the door to see if Colin was home and heard him crying as he walked up the side of the house) he told me that he fell off his skateboard and had a bunch of road rash. I don't remember him saying that he thought he broke a bone, but when I helped him take his t-shirt off he winced and I could tell right away that he had a broken collar bone. So we were at the hospital probably 20 minutes after it happened. He was wearing a helmet though, SO i'm really happy about that! A week later I washed his sling and shrunk it (silly mom!) and we had to go back to the hospital to get him a new one. The nurse there recognized me and remembered Adam and his accident last summer (she said she felt really bad putting the two slings on him). Pretty funny that my two guys have both broken their collar bones now. Everyone at work says it'll be my turn next summer. I hope not!! He's doing really well now and you can hardly tell that he broke it. He just can't carry a back pack on it yet, or climb up his bunk bed.

Well, I'm watching Blue Crush and scrapping, so I'm off to do that. I hope everyone is enjoying the start of summer!

Happy NSD!!

Hope everyone is having a great day! There's some fun stuff going on online today!

So, Adam pointed out that I hadn't posted about my 10km time yet. Last Sunday, April 29th, I ran my first 10km in 67:33. My goal was under 70:00, so I'm happy with it. I'm going to keep running though, and hopefully improve. There are a few girls in our run clinic who I ran with and next year we all want to break an hour. We've started running together on Saturday mornings (well...today was the first day since the race, but it will be a regular thing), and we might join the clinic again next year. Right now my goal is to start training for the Seattle halfmarathon in November though. Jenn and I are taking Heidi's class and when she said that was her goal I thought it was so fabulous that I copied her. I'm glad I did, because I enjoy running way more than I thought I would.

Well, off to scrap (and nap)! Have a great day!!!!

Inspiration

So, I've been watching Ali's blog lots in the last few days. Especially today. Today is the deadline for the Six Degrees contest. She's rocking this thing! I think in the last 24 hours, she's had almost 500 donations. Isn't that amazing? I was chatting with her about it last weekend. She had posted that she wanted to get 1000 donations by the end of March and then she said she deleted that, because she never thought she'd get there. I think she's such an inspiring, awesome, great person, that people want to give back to her. So cool!

So Artistry. It was amazing! Inspiring. Creative. Fun. I met some great people. They came from everywhere! That was cool. Long Beach Claifornia, Washington DC, Winnipeg...to name a few.

It started on Friday morning, but I headed over on Thursday afternoon. I made it to Shannon's by 5ish. Danielle was there already and we convinced Shannon to come down to Treasury of Memories with us instead of going to yogalates. Yeah! That was fun! We hit the mall and Bath and Body Works...best store ever! Then we headed over to Treasury, and even though we got there right as they were closing, they let us shop for 30 minutes. That was fun. Quick, but fun. I think by the time we got home and I got in bed, it was wll after midnight. Poor Shannon started getting sick on our way down and by the time we got home pretty muchhad a full on cold.

Friday morning I woke up and headed over to Richmond (from Port Coquitlam...if you know the area) early. I got there around 9am. Ali's class started at 10 that morning. So Jenn and I picked up our goodie bags and wandered around the Richmond Arts Center (is that what it was called?) until Ali's classroom ws ready for us to go hang out in. When I walked into Ali's class, she said "Hey Cate!". Ummm...how cool is that? She had remembered me from January! I was happy. *S*

The album we made that day was amazing. It's her Evolution album. The photo is on the Artistry site. It was ambitious actually. We spent all morning painting. And then the afternoon we started putting it together. I'm not actually sure if anyone finished it, but I know that Jenn and I didn't. Oh, and I'm SO mad! I didn't get a photo of Jenn, nine months pregnant! She's all belly. Looks like there's a basketball up her shirt. *S* Super cute!! So we spent the day with Ali, and left around 5pm. I went backt o Shannon's house, where I met her husband Jon (he was on a business trip the night before). Jon, Danielle and I went out for sushi that night (poor Shannon was sick). I can say with confidance, that I do not like sushi. But I gave it a try again and so that was good. And then we hit the mall so Danielle could pick up some photos, so I ran into Old Navy and bought this shirt. We hit McDonald's on the way home for a creme egg McFlurry. Yum!

Saturday we had classes all day with Donna Downey. We made two mini books. One in the morning and another in the afternoon. I really have to take photos of them, but again they are shown on the Artistry site. Super cute and easy to make. Donna is the funniest person I have ever met. She's real and honest and a total hoot. That was another great day of classes. Oh, and she had some TamTams. Her favourite cookies from Down Under. And she shared them with us. Yummy!!

Saturday night there was a crop at Clipper Street. It was at the Langley location, so almost an hour away, but a fun night. I was one of ony five of us maybe that made it to midnight. I think I made it to bed around 2am that morning...which is why I slept in the next morning and didn't wake up until 10:40am. And Claudine's class started at 10:00...an hour away. *S* Oops! I made it there by noon though. And it was fun. This is the one thing that I actually do have a photo of (see above...I don't know how to move the photos around in the new blogger). My Poppet. I had to use Chloe. I think it's kind of cute. Claudine is super sweet and at the crop on Saturday night she commented that scrapbookers take lots of photos. Isn't that funny?

So that's Artistry in a nut shell. I'd definitely go back again. They sent out a sheet for our feedbacka dn asked who we'd love to have next year, and I said Emily Falconbridge and Tia Bennett. Can you imagine taking a class from Emily? I bet it would be messy and super creative!

Hope you're having a great weekend!!

I have the stomach flu

So I'll update on Artistry, but it may take a couple of days. I went for a run yesterday and had absolutely no energy. Then I fell asleep before 9:00pm (without dinner) and woke up at 12:20am. By 1:00am I was getting sick. I'm feeling better than I was (ie...not throwing up anymore) but I still feel icky. I hope I can go back to work tomorrow. The weather was beautiful today!

And my sweet letter carrier, Michelle, came around to my side door to give me my Scrapologie kit because I wasn't at work. Isn't that sweet?

Well, off to bed again. I'm going to take another gravol tonight so I can sleep the night away!

Artistry

I'm home.

It was fabulous.

I'm really tired. *S*

I love Ali, Donna and Claudine (she thinks scrapbookers take lots of pictures *S*).

I'll post more tomorrow.

Five kilometers

Yep...I ran it!

Back in January I joined a run clinic. In Heidi's class this year we had to set a goal and Jenn came up with the idea to run the Seattle half marathon. I loved that goal so I asked if she minded if I did it too. So I joined a run clinic to run a 10km race in April (the last Sunday...eek, I'm nervous!). And with the entry fee into the clinic we got this 5 km race yesterday.

So I did it.

I wanted to beat the 40:00 mark.

I ran it in 33:27.

I'm just a little excited!!!

It's not by any means going to win me any races, but I'm feeling like I'll be able to finish the 10km in less than an hour and a half now.

And when I finshed the race I told myself that I had just ran one quarter of a half marathon. And when I do the 10km in April, that's pretty much half of a half marathon (a half marathon is 21 kms). So I'll be able to do it by November. *S*

And only a week and a half until Artistry...and Ali...and seeing Jenn's super cute baby belly! I really hope the baby has a little foot sticking out so I can feel it! She's due so soon! I'm just a little excited for her. I'll be counting down the days until the Pick of the Patch retreat at the end of May so I can see the baby. He/she should be about six weeks old by then.

Have a great week!!!!!

Mini book

In only five weeks Artistry happens! I'm so excited. Ali's class was so fabulous a month ago that I can hardly wait for the next one. And it's her last planned class, except CKU, for the next year or two. She said she's not going to be teaching for a while.

And because Artistry is only five weeks away, that means that Jenn's baby is only about seven weeks away. I'm so excited for her!!

Here's a little mini book I made with Memory Lane's February store kit. I love the papers! I added a few of my own things too. Enjoy! I took the title from 10 Things I Hate About You (cute movie) and changed it to Love.







Isn't that nose adorable! And those little teeth are too cute. Tiny and so white.

CHA

So, I'm LOVING all the sneak peeks coming out! I think I saw an owl on some of the new Basic Grey! How super cute is that going to be? And here's a sneak peek for Karen's newest Tin Box Creations stamps. How cool are those clock stamps!?!

Ali Edwards stepped on my photo!!

Sunday was the BEST day! This whole weekend was amazing!

Jenn picked me up from the ferry terminal at 12:45 and we drove down to Bellingham, WA for a class with Karen Russell. She is SO sweet and creative and we got a TON of stuff in the class kit! The class projects are amazingly beautiful and I'll try to take photos that due them justice (probably on the weekend). I left the class feeling creative and excited. And we still had Ali on Sunday!

Sunday we went to Ali. We got there just a few minutes before it started and got our seats. There were some other people there that we knew so we chatted and waited anxiously for the class to start. You know all those wonderfully beautiful mini books that Ali posts on her blog and that are in the magazine (that amazingly beautiful one made out of transparencies). She had brought them for us to look at! Holding those and looking through them is an experience! They are SO amazing! She has got to be one of the most talented scrappers ever! It was so awesome to look at them all. We were in both classes so we made a mini book in the morning and one in the afternoon. The morning one was Favourite Photos and the afternoon one was Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow, Always. I'm pretty much finished the morning one, except for the journalling. The afternoon one is not quite done because I need smaller photos for it. I'm going to look throught everything tomorrow because I found some super cute baby photos of Colin today that might look cute in it.

Jenn and I were in the class and Karen was supposed to come from Princeton, but she got the stomach flu and couldn't make it and I was so disappointed that Tammy wasn't there. Luckily she had just gotten lost on her way there (that happened to me last time so I sympathized *S*) and she was just a little late (and caught up really well!!). Pretty much everyone was in both classes and Jenn, Tammy and I were the only ones who hung around at lunch. Ali decided to give away some stuff to us, so that was exciting. It was awesome to have such an intimate conversation with her. She's so real and down to earth and makes everyone feel like you're her best friend.

Ali stepped on my photo in the morning class and there was a funny joke about it (a comment about how I wouldn't be caring because it was Ali Edwards *S*), but I wasn't there to hear it (maybe Jenn can tell that story). The photo is in my book now and everytime a scrapper looks at my album I'll be pointing out the photo and saying "Ali Edwards stepped on that photo!", so whatever the whole class was laughing about it justified. *S*

I'm happy to be home now, with all the fun stuff I bought this weekend, including some brand new, being released at CHA next week, Fontwerks paper...jealous?...it's super cool, my Hambly transparencies and some fun new 7 Gypsies rub-ons. What is it with being inspired and having to buy new stuff? *S* Not that I need an excuse to buy Hambly or 7 Gypsies! We were having fun seeing what was in Ali's basket and buying that so we can copy all her projects when she makes them.

Well, off to bed. I'm hoping to be able to scrap right from when I get home from work tomorrow until bed time. Have a great week everyone! Hugs!!

Happy New Year!!

Today Heidi Swapp's class started on Big Picture Scrapbooking. The class is called A Year to Remember. When I was listening to Heidi audio message today, I was so excited for the next year. I'll try to share what I make each week. This week I just have to figure out what I want my goal to be. Something to work on throughout the year.

Colin is going to be thirteen in a couple of weeks. That's just crazy! He will officially be a teenager. Three more years until he's old enough to get his drivers licence.

Here's a few more photos from our trip. Colin was so cute and took my camera to take pictures when we drove through the tree in the Redwood Forest in California. He took eight photos, some close, some further away. Definitely my kid. *S*



Here's Colin in front of the Golden Gate bridge. I absoloutely fell in love with San Francisco! It's a gorgeous city. The traffic, leaving the city during rush hour, was crazy though!





This is the kids in the pool at our hotel in Vegas (the Luxor). They loved Vegas! We let them roam in the hotel (the second floor had a double level arcade).



This is me walking in, I think, California Adventure. The weather was gorgeous the whole time we were there!



This is me in the Hollywood hills, taking a picture of the Hollywood sign. We didn't see any celebrities, but we drove on Mullholland Drive and went to the Chinese Theater. The hill that we hiked is where all the famous celebrities get caught by cameras when they are trying to walk their dogs. No such lucky sightings for us though.



This is Colin on Venice Beach. We went to the Venice Beach boardwalk and walked around. It's the boardwalk that's famous in movies. We also went to the Santa Cruz boardwalk. The rides were closed because it was evening, but the kids played games in a huge arcade.



We got stuck in rush hour in Malibu too. I kind of wish we had pulled over and hung out on the beach for a while because it was so pretty, but we had had not much sleep that night (we thought California would be warmer for camping in December...apparently not), so we weren't really thinking clearly.